Читать книгу Tour Climbs: The complete guide to every mountain stage on the Tour de France - Chris Sidwells - Страница 39

1 STAR

Length: 18.8 km

Altitude: 1920 metres

Height gain: 670 metres

Average gradient: 3.6%

Maximum gradient: 5.3%

WHAT TO EXPECT

Busy first bit. All heavy goods vehicles must go through the Puymorens tunnel after five kilometres of the climb and a lot of other traffic follows them too.

Closed in. Approaching the Puymorens tunnel entrance you enter the Défile de Fau, which can feel a bit claustrophobic, but soon after the tunnel you begin the hairpin sections that snake out onto the wide open mountainside.

Great view. From the summit of the pass the Carol valley and its tributaries look spectacular. You also get good views of the Pics Font Négre to the south.

Confusing descent. There is a spaghetti tangle of roads on the descent to Ax-les-Thermes where the Puymorens tunnel emerges.

Open all year. Even though it is high, the Col de Puymorens is open all year.

This climb looks more impressive than it is. At the top you are high up, quite close to 2000 metres of altitude, and looking down at the climb’s southwestern side, which is the nicest to climb, the way up looks steep. But it’s not. This climb is already quite high when it starts, and it only gains 670 metres in 18 kilometres.

So why have I made it a major climb? Firstly, because of it’s history, the Puymorens had its first Tour de France visit in 1913 and has been in regular use since. Secondly, the southwest side of the climb is just a beautiful place to be.

The climb starts at Carol, which is on the N20 main road, but inside the Catalan Pyrenees national park. This is the part of the Eastern Pyrenees that is most heavily influence by associations with Spain. Apart from a period between 1463 and 1493, this area was ruled by the kings of Aragon, then by the Spanish kingdom until 1659, and it is here that the Occitan language that you can still see in Pyrenean place names was born.

The climb is easy at first, up the Carol river valley with the towering Carlit massif on your right and the Pic Orientaux de Font Négre on your left. Don’t worry if the road is busy at this point; after five kilometres you get to the entrance of the Puymorens tunnel and much of the traffic goes through that.

The true character of this climb comes out after the tunnel, when you begin to climb what essentially is the side of the Pic Pédrous (2842 metres) by means of a series of hairpin bends with steeper straights of around five percent gradient between them. The valley that the first hairpin loops into is formed by the stream that issues from a huge lake up at nearly 2000 metres altitude called the Étang de Lanous.

From the top of the climb you can descend down the Ariège valley to Ax-les-Thermes, which is where the ascent of the other side of Puymorens starts, or you can climb a bit of the French side of the Port d’Envalira and drop into Andorra. Both of these roads are very busy with traffic though.

WHICH WAY?

Carol is on the N20 10 kilometres northwest of the Spanish border town of Puigcerdà and 40 kilometres west of Font Romeu, which is in France and has plenty of hotels. Take the D618 southwest out of Font Romeu and turn right after 17 kilometres at the junction with the N20. Continue on the N20 to Carol and follow this road to the top of the Col de Puymorens.

The first crossing of the Col de Puymorens by a Tour rider was Michel Buysse of Belgium in 1913. Three Buysse brothers raced in the Tour de France with Lucien winning in 1926.

The Tour has climbed the Col de Puymorens from both sides, and visited many times before the Second World War. However, since then the climb has been used only six times, the last was in 1993.

Best man on the Puymorens in 1964 was Julio Jiménez, another Spaniard who is considered to have been one of the greatest climbers. He was very lightly built and never looked under any stress as he danced his way uphill. A British Tour rider of the 1960s, Vin Denson, says that Jiménez seemed to climb just by fluttering his eyelids.

The Col du Puymorens with the Carlit massif behind it

Clouds around the summit